I am not big on this blending in approach

[April_TO]

I second Squircle, my goal is to blend in and it's happening sooner than I expected. Yes, I am partially stealth as people at work knew me prior to transition. However, outside of work - no one knows.

Life is working so far However, April Lee your spirit and grace is truly inspiring.

Thing is it's not a one size fits all solution. I prefer to blend because it helps me feel comfortable and happy. It doesn't make me less authentic and it doesn't mean I'm running away from anything. I'm glad that you've found a style and way of presenting yourself that works for you and I think it's great that you do that, but if people want to blend or pass or even live stealth then that's fine too.

[SarahSchilling]

Hehehe...I'm not big on the drawing attention approach.

I think it's more a matter of personality than anything else. I'm pretty guarded around people who I don't know. (I tend to have little in common with most of them, anyway!)

To each their own, though!

[Emily E]

Blending in is more then how you look it having confidence in yourself and how you look... when I was in high school the tallest person in my class was 6'7" and she was very popular no one ever questioned that she was a girl why would they she was comfortable being who she was.   If your out and someone says or asks you if your a guy just say no and move on or play it off and start giving them a hard time about it (because you really are not a guy are you)... my wife has been called sir or gets referred to as a guy occasionally and she just rolls with it and moves on because its something that happens she doesn't let it bother her because to her its no big deal and because she thinks of it that way no one ever questions her further.  Just have confidence in yourself and you will blend.

[April Lee]

I will add another angle that I think comes into play here. As I move farther into transition, my social life has more and more become centered around LGBT people. I go to LGBT friendly clubs and have made a number of friends there, especially among gay men. Because that world exists for me, I don't feel the pressure that some might feel in environments where there doesn't exist such a community.

[Tessa James]

Blend in? What's that? 

Hugs, Devlyn

Well a "blending" of ingredients in this case may be easier than "folding" them in to create our recipes for success??

[Tessa James]

I think the age difference makes it or break it with blending in. It's a far a different reality for us young transitioners. My goal was never to blend in honestly, it just sort of happened that way. For the longest time I presented andro but I later found out that wasn't for me.

Blending in is a big deal still since a lot of us in our teens/early 20s are trying to get our lives started and reach some sort of financial stability else we might find ourselves in terrible situations, especially if you're a trans woman of color. So blending in for us helps a ton in everyday society with finding a job and being independent. Not blending in just makes everything so much harder for us unfortunately. Again I'm saying this from a young transitioner's perspective.

Thank you for this perspective.  It is a different reality for those of us who are still in the work place and transitioning at  younger ages.  And really, I hope people will learn from old geeks, like me, about how much better it might be to address our gender identity early in life.  Gender identity issues with gender dysphoria is progressive and for many, a debilitating concern until we deal with it.  And we deal with ourselves in uniquely ingenious ways.  We do not know with any certainty how our lives might have turned out if we had started at a younger age and attained the presentation we dream of, but I sure have heard a few regrets about it!

[Tessa James]

I will add another angle that I think comes into play here. As I move farther into transition, my social life has more and more become centered around LGBT people. I go to LGBT friendly clubs and have made a number of friends there, especially among gay men. Because that world exists for me, I don't feel the pressure that some might feel in environments where there doesn't exist such a community.

Not trying to hog the reply line but this a cool discussion.  April you and I would have a blast out and about and I too tend to have a circle of friends and support around that includes the whole rainbow of non conforming folks.  We had a dance party last Saturday that featured just such a theme and it was amazing.  People obviously felt such freedom to be themselves and live out loud.  We were up dancing till 2:30 in Astoria.  I wish it happened more often as that is when my tutu comes out of the closet:-)

[April Lee]

Whenever there is a discussion on this subject, the word "attention" invariably comes up. As a male, I was pretty introverted. One of the strange things that has come of out my transition is the fact my personality has become very much extroverted. It isn't that I feel the need to be in the spotlight, but rather that I feel utterly comfortable in it. I just let the chains come completely off, an be whatever I feel inside.

My dancing, which I have talked about in other threads, has gained me a considerable amount of notoriety in the local club scene. I am not technically a good dancer at all, but I just let it flow out of me. Sometimes I just rock and sometimes I dance rather slow and sexy. But it is always very honest. I emote a great deal while doing it. I have even cried on occasion. I make the whole club my dance floor and will try cover ever corner of it. I dance like nobody is watching, but I know everybody is. It is like is just doesn't matter anymore. I find actually a great deal of comfort being that open.

[April Lee]

Tessa, Next time you have a party, you got to invite me. I never refuse invitations where dancing is involved.

[Tessa James]

April is Carefree a real place?  You are so there!  Should you get up here near the Oregon coast please do give me a jingle and we will get to dancing all night long...

[iKate]

Be who you want, but I am the blendtec lady. I do blend!

I honestly never expected it but for the most part I am totally unremarkable in most people's eyes. When I go full time and get my voice fixed fewer people will even suspect. It will all just be natural.

But if you want to be out and proud, that is cool!

About younger transitioners, it's not just about you girls/guys. For me, I have to visit some violently transphobic places so I need to pass. Then again I am not that old. I think Lynn Conway was in her late 20s/early 30s when she transitioned and even had a wife and 2 kids. She lived stealth for a long while. I don't know if stealth is for me but it does seem appealing. Maybe not deep stealth but some degree of stealth.

[April Lee]

April is Carefree a real place?  You are so there!  Should you get up here near the Oregon coast please do give me a jingle and we will get to dancing all night long...

Tessa, Carefree is at the far North East corner of the Phoenix metro area. To the North and to the East there are mountains and almost nothing for about a 100 miles. Below is a picture taken about 500 feet from my front door. However, I am only about 23 miles from downtown Scottsdale, going the other direction. I have never been in the North West part of the country, but I know it is beautiful up your way. I might just have to take a trip there, and I promise I will look you up if that happens.

[Sydney_NYC]

Blending in is more then how you look it having confidence in yourself and how you look... when I was in high school the tallest person in my class was 6'7" and she was very popular no one ever questioned that she was a girl why would they she was comfortable being who she was.   If your out and someone says or asks you if your a guy just say no and move on or play it off and start giving them a hard time about it (because you really are not a guy are you)... my wife has been called sir or gets referred to as a guy occasionally and she just rolls with it and moves on because its something that happens she doesn't let it bother her because to her its no big deal and because she thinks of it that way no one ever questions her further.  Just have confidence in yourself and you will blend.

With me being 6'7" I can confirm that no one thinks I'm trans because I'm tall. It's never clocked me and for over a year I've been gendered female all the time unless someone isn't looking directly at me and assumes male from just seeing someone really tall out of the corner of their eye. (Like a cashier counting their money as I approach) and every time that has happened they apologized and correctly gendered me as female. The worse that has happened was I was asked if I was an Amazon woman, LOL. (Happened to me this morning at Dunkin Donuts when the person turned around and was shocked to see a 6'7" woman.)

[Ashey]

This is sort of an odd conversation for me. I blend right in and did very quickly after starting my transition. It was just in the cards. I don't go out of my way to blend either, like I don't wear much make-up (often none at all) and will sometimes even wear some guy clothes. But regardless, I still pass easily. So it's not so much a choice to blend in as it is a consequence of transitioning for me. Then again, I could talk in my natural male tone, but what would be the point? I guess this is all really about denying our pasts or not, right? In my case it's difficult because I ended up being stealth unintentionally. I wouldn't deny to anyone that I'm trans, but then it just never comes up. Nobody suspects, and even when I present my old ID, nobody says anything about it or treats me differently. Since it never comes up, there's no real point for me to stir the pot and intentionally out myself. Is my lack of trans-visibility denying who I am? Or is it just me being me? My boyfriend doesn't want me to tell anyone, as in intentionally outing myself. To me that's an issue because yeah, I'm denying who I am for someone else. But at the same time, I don't have much reason to tell anyone. Sure editing my past can sometimes irk me, but it's not a huge deal I suppose. I guess in the end, as lame as it is to hide part of my life from people, it's just not in my best interest at the moment to intentionally expose myself like that. For me blending in isn't a choice, but not blending in would be. Sorry if I'm rambling, sometimes this stuff just gets all complicated for me. Probably another reason to just go with the flow and blend rather than intentionally shake things up any more than they are considering everything else going on in my life right now.

[April Lee]

I believe that blending in and passing are related concepts, but by no means the same thing. When I hear blending in, the way it seems to get used is avoiding things that would put the spotlight on you, or other words, things that get attention. I suppose the idea here is that more attention one gets, the more scrutiny. I don't seek attention, but it doesn't bother me either. As I have said elsewhere, I was somewhat of an introvert in my male life, who has become extremely extroverted as a female. Much of what I do seems to put me in a position to standout. For example, just driving a convertible sports car (which I own) is not a choice that is probably conducive of blending in. Driving that convertible with the top down, and my long red hair flowing in the breeze is going to cause people to look. But I can actually pass at about 15 feet away pretty well. I know this because I have had a fair number guys make fools of themselves when I am at a traffic light, but because I draw that attention, I am more likely to get clocked as well, and pretty quickly. I just need to open my mouth for that to happen. But the risk of being clocked doesn't concern me. I don't fear that, and I am not going to compromise on an experience I want to have.

[Emileeeee]

I have similar views. The thing that got me to a point where I really needed to transition was a need to stop faking it to everyone. I get there are some things that are unavoidable if you don't want to draw too much attention to yourself, like voice, but trying to fake a walk or mannerisms seems excessive to me. Not saying it's not right for anybody else. It's just not right for me. I spent the first half of my life faking everything from mannerisms, to likes and dislikes, and even the way I dance and walk. I'll do the standard feminizations like hormones, voice, and makeup, but aside from that I intend to shift my focus away from my mannerisms and into my life, where it belongs.

[April Lee]

I have similar views. The thing that got me to a point where I really needed to transition was a need to stop faking it to everyone. I get there are some things that are unavoidable if you don't want to draw too much attention to yourself, like voice, but trying to fake a walk or mannerisms seems excessive to me. Not saying it's not right for anybody else. It's just not right for me. I spent the first half of my life faking everything from mannerisms, to likes and dislikes, and even the way I dance and walk. I'll do the standard feminizations like hormones, voice, and makeup, but aside from that I intend to shift my focus away from my mannerisms and into my life, where it belongs.

Emileeeee, It is interesting you bring this up, because I have been thinking about my own search for authenticity a great deal, and have reached a few conclusions about who I really am. My soul is extremely feminine, but along the way I had to learn how to cope in the world and developed an extremely masculine facade. In Freud's terminology this outer facade would be called my "super ego". It is that part of me that handles societal expectations. I suppose what I call my "soul" or "core" is somewhat analogous to Freud's "Id", but Freud saw the Id as being as just a center of our more base emotions. I see the soul as the very essence of who we are, or our true authentic self. As I see it, just going with my raw instincts is tapping directly into that part of me that is most feminine. When I try to contrive something, I am reaching into that part of me that is my super ego, and the part that is most masculine.

[Emileeeee]

Emileeeee, It is interesting you bring this up, because I have been thinking about my own search for authenticity a great deal, and have reached a few conclusions about who I really am. My soul is extremely feminine, but along the way I had to learn how to cope in the world and developed an extremely masculine facade. In Freud's terminology this outer facade would be called my "super ego". It is that part of me that handles societal expectations. I suppose what I call my "soul" or "core" is somewhat analogous to Freud's "Id", but Freud saw the Id as being as just a center of our more base emotions. I see the soul as the very essence of who we are, or our true authentic self. As I see it, just going with my raw instincts is tapping directly into that part of me that is most feminine. When I try to contrive something, I am reaching into that part of me that is my super ego, and the part that is most masculine.

That's actually what made me think that I don't need to put so much stock in mannerisms. I spent years trying to adopt masculine mannerisms only to find out that the feminine ones still got through when I wasn't looking. If they're already there, I don't feel the need to try to learn them any differently. I was never gendered female while in male mode (aside from one time as a kid with long hair) despite these feminine mannerisms, so I expect that the same would be true on the flip side.

[Kellam]

That's actually what made me think that I don't need to put so much stock in mannerisms. I spent years trying to adopt masculine mannerisms only to find out that the feminine ones still got through when I wasn't looking. If they're already there, I don't feel the need to try to learn them any differently. I was never gendered female while in male mode (aside from one time as a kid with long hair) despite these feminine mannerisms, so I expect that the same would be true on the flip side.

Once I stopped trying to make everything I did super masculine and just let myself be me I discovered just how bad a job I was doing at portraying manhood. From the way I walk, talk, use my hands, to the way I sit. Everything was feminine. I was called on it a few times in the closet but no one noticed. My male skin was all it took. The story I told about me. Thats what everyone saw. But they were actually seeing a woman making fists while she walked, wrists toward her hips. I found out here that men walk with their wrists facing backwards. Palms scooping the air. I watched people walk for a week, fascinated by this simple observation. Even though my hands were in fists, they were facing the wrong way and ever so slightly upturned at the wrist.

Heck, when my folks put a bottle in my hands for the first time as a baby, my pinky went right up...and it never stopped.